"Did I not tell you," said the other, "that of all the world, I am the most cruelly misunderstood?"
"But you confessed to the masquerade."
"Oh, blind, blind, not to see behind the foolish masque. Come, we have not yet drunk."
He placed the cup in Verrill's hands, and once again raised the glass.
"To our better acquaintance," he said.
"To our better acquaintance," echoed Verrill. He drained the cup.
"The lees were bitter," he observed.
"But the effect?"
"Yes, it is calming—already, exquisitely so. It is not—as I have imagined for so long, deadening, on the contrary, it is invigorating, revivifying. I feel born again."
The other rose: "Then there is no need," he said, "to stay here any longer. Come, shall we be going?"